Paladin: Tricked Into Killing the Wrong Target

[Endur]

This happened a few years ago in Living Greyhawk. No Spoilers, as I believe the module is retired now.

During the adventure, the party (under duress) agreed not to harm an evil minion if the minion ceased his evil ways and helped the party accomplish its goals.

The minion betrayed the party, and appearently slew several members of the party with spells.

The paladin slew the minion.

The minion had been pretending to cast evil spells. His invisible Evil Master had actually cast the spells that slew the PCs.

The party then destroys the invisible evil master after they discover the invisible enemy.

Should there be any ramifications to the Paladin's actions?

The Paladin had agreed to judge the evil minion by his actions and not his past. Is Death too severe of a penalty for the action of "pretending to cast evil spells" even when his pretending allowed his master to kill several party members? The minion's actions would seem to fall under the category of conspiracy to commit murder, aiding and abetting, etc.


What if an Illusionist had cast a spell, making a complete innocent appear to be the Evil Master? Are there any ramifications to the Paladin slaying someone who is themselves a victim of the evildoer?


My personal opinion is that the Paladin can act in both cases above and still be lawful good and not violate his tenets. I also believe that two Lawful Good Paladins could fight one another on the battlefield and not violate their oaths.

 

[ThirdWizard]

If you pretend to cast evil spells at a paladin, you should realize that you're going to get smitten. That doesn't even make sense. Why would a person do that? I'm lost here. No loss of paladin powers for that. The person invited it upon himself.

An illusion? I have to say loss of powers for this one. Is it fair? No. Life isn't fair, though. The paladin can, of course, atone and get his powers back. Just like I would take away a paladin's powers for killing a dominated good person. Fair? Nope. But, hey, like I said, they can atone.

 

[Lord Pendragon]

My personal opinion is that the Paladin can act in both cases above and still be lawful good and not violate his tenets. I also believe that two Lawful Good Paladins could fight one another on the battlefield and not violate their oaths.

I agree with you. I don't believe a paladin can be tricked into losing the favor of his god. If he kills an innocent because of the schemes of an evil illusionist, his god will not deem him unworthy, although the paladin will probably feel really guilty, and the god may demand that the paladin slay the evil illusionist for his crime.

In essence, so long as the paladin's heart is in the right place, he's secure in his paladinhood, regardless of whether he's tricked, or evil is simply too smart/powerful for him. It's when the paladin's heart begins to stray, when he willfully begins to think "well, just one innocent lost doesn't matter much in the long run..." or "torture may be bad, but it's all right if it gets me the information I need to slay the evil wizard" that he begins to stray into dangerous territory.

 

[EdL]

In the first instance there is no question that the minon had it coming. He was being Chaotic Stupid!

The second is more open to interpertation, and is why I never play Paladins.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

The minion in the first instance commited dumbicide - no penalty. (And avoidable, let the paladin know ahead of time stupid!)

In the second example the paladin may well want to atone, but does not suffer a penalty from his god. Being tricked into something is not an evil act. No interpretation needed.

The Auld Grump

 

[DonTadow]

I agree with you. I don't believe a paladin can be tricked into losing the favor of his god. If he kills an innocent because of the schemes of an evil illusionist, his god will not deem him unworthy, although the paladin will probably feel really guilty, and the god may demand that the paladin slay the evil illusionist for his crime.

In essence, so long as the paladin's heart is in the right place, he's secure in his paladinhood, regardless of whether he's tricked, or evil is simply too smart/powerful for him. It's when the paladin's heart begins to stray, when he willfully begins to think "well, just one innocent lost doesn't matter much in the long run..." or "torture may be bad, but it's all right if it gets me the information I need to slay the evil wizard" that he begins to stray into dangerous territory.

I don't think that a paladin can be tricked into losing his god's favor either.

The bottom line is that the god knows exactly what happened and a just god would be understanding of situations such as this.

 

[Ry]

The first one is a no-brainer; Paladin was fighting evil, no loss of powers.

The second one is trickier, but if the paladin was tricked into killling a complete innocent, I'd let him keep his powers, but I'd suggest that he should feel the need to atone. Any player that didn't feel that way shouldn't be playing a paladin - but I don't agree with taking away the powers.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Neither action is a violation of the Paladin code which disallows willingly commiting an evil act. It is not possible to trick a Paladin into violating his code.

It should be obvious that a properly roleplayed Paladin would be stirred to great action by being tricked into an act that normally would be considered evil, including some form of atonement.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

During the adventure, the party (under duress) agreed not to harm an evil minion if the minion ceased his evil ways and helped the party accomplish its goals.

The minion betrayed the party, and appearently slew several members of the party with spells.

The paladin slew the minion.

I'm all cool with that. No power loss.

What if an Illusionist had cast a spell, making a complete innocent appear to be the Evil Master? Are there any ramifications to the Paladin slaying someone who is themselves a victim of the evildoer?

He didn't willingly commit an evil act. No power loss.

To inflict power loss here is to demand that the Paladin Detect Evil on each and every opponent he faces in combat. Since his DE ability works like the spell, that's 18 seconds per conic area of effect, standing and scanning..meanwhile, his allies are in combat.

However, if there were things that should have made the Paladin suspicious of the nature of his "foes", such as knowing he's fighting an illusionist or someone who casts dominate frequently, then he should re-examine his wilingness to attack without verification of the presence of evil.

From a role-play perspective, he should probably seek forgiveness from the slain person's family or community, and do some kind of deed in the name of the deceased, like vow to bring the Illusionists' ill-gotten wealth to the survivors as a kind of weirgeld.

 

[ThirdWizard]

Ah, see, I interpriet "willingly" as not being forced or coherced by magic to do the act. Being fooled or tricked doesn't count, he's still willingly doing the act.